With virtue

The old man was released by Zhao Yunshu and stood there stunned for a long time. He reached out and touched the spot on his neck where the sword blade had touched him, and then looked down at his empty waist.

The green gourd is still in Zhao Yunshu's hands.

Needless to say, the young Taoist priest, though not old, was quite capable; I've completely lost face.

Just now, he had a sword to my neck, and I was both ashamed and angry. I wished he would just give me a quick death.

However, the young Taoist priest released him instead and politely asked him why, which made the old man feel even more embarrassed.

"Sigh, well, well, since I've already failed and made a fool of myself, hiding it now would only make me look petty. I might as well just say it outright," he sighed and said.

He straightened his disheveled clothes, raised his head to look at Zhao Yunshu: "A few days ago, a monk was murdered on Dingyao Mountain. The monk's Buddhist name was Yuanmeng. Was it you who did it?"

Zhao Yun thought to himself that he had indeed come for the sake of fulfilling his dream. He didn't hide anything and nodded frankly, saying, "That's right, I killed him. That monk was a wicked monk who had killed many people and even tried to kill me as well, so I killed him."

Upon hearing this, the old man showed no particular emotion, simply saying, "You have your reasons for killing him, and I will not argue with you about that. I am merely following orders."

Then he continued, "That monk has a handsome face and is our boss's lover. A few days ago, our boss received news that something happened to him at Ding Kiln, so he sent me to investigate who did it."

Zhao Yunshu's eyebrows twitched when he heard the word "mistress".

Although the monk who fulfilled his dream possessed a handsome appearance, he was a venomous demon who lived in symbiosis with snakes. The fact that someone would actually take him as a lover was something he never expected. He sized up the old man and asked, "And what is the background of your leader?"

The old man shook his head and said, "I am no match for you and have been defeated. You can kill me or do whatever you want with me, but I cannot mention the name of the head of the family."

He said this calmly, not out of spite, but probably because he genuinely felt that betraying his master was more shameful than being killed.

"Then let me rephrase the question: Is the head of your household a man or a woman?" Zhao Yunshu asked again.

"That's a ridiculous statement. The monk is a man, so our leader is naturally a woman," the old man said.

"The woman... my lover, doesn't seem like a decent person either. In that case, I'd better run away." Zhao Yunshu shook his head.

"Heh, our boss is so stingy. You've offended her, and even if you hide at the ends of the earth, it'll be hard to get away with it. She'll definitely send people to find you," the old man said, shaking his head.

Zhao Yunshu didn't care about this statement; he just wanted to get away from it.

However, there is a problem.

"By the way, old man, judging from your appearance, you seem like a man of principle. Why would you risk your life for such a person?" Zhao Yunshu examined the gourd, turning it over and over in his mind.

The old man curled his lip: "It's just taking money. I've practiced magic all my life. If I don't earn some money and enjoy myself, wouldn't it be a waste of my life's practice and decades of suffering? By the way, since the gourd has fallen into your hands, I have no face to ask for it back. But I have been practicing for many years, so you should remember to take good care of it and not ruin my things."

"This gourd, every time the moon is full, when the yin energy of the sky is strong, must be buried in the ground to absorb the yin energy of the earth, and then soaked in a woman's fresh blood to absorb the yin energy of the human body. In this way, all three yin energies are present. This is the method of absorbing qi. You Taoists should—"

As the old man finished speaking, he suddenly realized that a piece of iron sword had pierced through his throat, the tip of the sword protruding from the back of his neck, bringing with it a cloud of blood mist.

His eyes widened, but he could only utter a few muffled breaths. He raised his hand as if to cover the wound on his throat, but it fell limply halfway up, and he fell backward and died.

It was Zhao Yunshu. He thrust his iron sword forward, piercing the opponent's throat and killing him instantly.

Zhao Yunshu stepped forward, bent down, grasped the hilt of the sword, and pulled the iron sword from the old man's throat. He carefully wiped the blade clean on the old man's clothes before sheathing it.

To be honest, Zhao Yunshu originally didn't intend to kill him. However, considering his age, his apparent backbone, and his somewhat comical nature, letting him go wasn't out of the question.

But the young Taoist priest couldn't pretend he hadn't heard what he said.

But just hearing about the so-called "head of the household's" style and the old man's method of maintaining the gourd made him change his mind.

Sure enough, the group of demons who were colluding with the evil monk were another bunch of demons!

This old man seemed to have some sense of righteousness, but he was still someone who treated human life like dirt!

He placed the gourd on the ground, and with a flick of his palm, fire suddenly appeared on the ground, burning the gourd and the corpse, along with the bamboo section, to ashes.

After it burned to ashes, they found that there were still a few souls left in the gourd's remains, about five or six.

The souls were all female, most of them were remnants of the soul, and they were insane. Only one looked relatively fresh and still retained some consciousness.

These spirits were released after the gourd was burned, and they immediately let out mournful cries. Then, fearing the sun, they hid underground.

Only the one who still possessed consciousness endured the excruciating pain, refusing to leave immediately. Despite being burned, he bowed to the young Taoist priest, saying, "Thank you, sir! Thank you, sir!"

Although the woman's soul was new, it was still a spirit. The sunlight scorched her body as if it were being pricked by needles. She knelt on the ground, trembling all over. She wanted to cry but dared not make a sound. She just kept kowtowing and repeatedly said, "Thank you, sir."

Zhao Yunshu could tell that she looked to be only sixteen or seventeen years old, dressed in a faded coarse cloth dress, with her hair tied in the double buns of an unmarried woman. She wondered whose daughter she was and how she had been harmed by that old scoundrel.

Thinking of this, the young Taoist priest reached out, opened his sleeve, and created a patch of shade to prevent the woman's soul from being baked to death by the sun.

Then he said, "There's no need to call me sir. That old man has harmed countless people. It's his fate to meet me. This is his calamity. Now that I've released you, find a shady place to hide and go reincarnate tonight. Otherwise, you'll be exposed to the wind and sun and won't even have a way to reincarnate."

"Master Dao, you saved me from reincarnation, a truly life-saving grace. I have no way to repay you but to be your servant in my next life. Also... Master Dao, do you know who you killed?"

"Do you know who that old man is?" Zhao Yunshu asked.

"Of course I know, but I was worried that my benefactor would suffer retaliation, so I dared not remain silent! I was originally from Lijiazhuang outside Dingzhou City. Half a month ago, I was kidnapped by that old thief and sealed in a gourd, never to see the light of day. I didn't know the details at first, but after being captured, I was locked in a cellar with several other sisters. I only learned a little bit by listening to that old thief talking to the female ghost every day. That old thief called himself the 'Old Man of Three Yin' and worked under a female ghost called 'Nine Beauties'."

"That female ghost boasted to everyone she met about her acquaintance with some 'Plum Blossom Fairy,' saying that she and the Fairy had been friends for a hundred years, and that she was the second sister when the Fairy was alive. Now that the Fairy had disappeared, she had started her own sect. I don't really understand any of this, I only remember that the Nine Beauties were terrifying, and that all the sisters in the gourd were killed by them. I've only been dead for three days, and my soul is still intact, which is why I've managed to retain my senses. I only remember that I was captured and taken to a deserted village west of Dingzhou City. They occupied the largest house in the village as their hideout. As for whether it's still there now, I really don't know."